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The Chancellor later admitted that the forecasts held a high degree of uncertainty and OBR chairman Robert Chote said there was a 50 per cent chance of them being wrong, but a row erupted as Brexit-backing Tory MPs criticised them as too gloomy.

Former Cabinet minister John Redwood said: 'The OBR are probably still quite wrong about 2017 - their forecast is too low, their borrowing forecast is too high, and we will get good access to the single market once we are out of the EU.'

Gilt yields rose on the back of the details and the Autumn Statement announcements. The yield on these UK government bonds is a benchmark that reflects how much it costs the country to borrow money.

Meanwhile the pound rallied to $1.25 and €1.18 as investor confidence around the UK economy rose, and the gold price climbed to $1,213.8 an ounce.

Conservative MP Jacob Rees-Mogg also criticised the OBR. 'It seems to me that there are two problems with those assumptions,' he said.

'One is that they assume that we will apply tariffs on the same basis inside the European Union, which the Chancellor will know he will be able to remove.

The OBR themselves admit there is a 50% chance their forecast is 'too gloomy'

Aside from estate agents, who took a pounding earlier in the day on the news of the ban on tenant fees, there was little movement from other stock market-listed firms which may have expected to be hit hard.

Shares in Direct Line Insurance fell 2.1 per cent, or 7.6p, to 348.4p and Admiral Group was down 2.1 per cent, or 41p, to 1926p after another raid on insurance premium tax was unveiled. Although this will bring in £4billion for the Treasury, the cost is passed on to consumers.

And a forthcoming review of the energy market did little to move utilities firms. SSE slipped 1p to 1461p.

As expected, Mr Hammond ditched predecessor George Osborne's fiscal rules – which included running a surplus in 2019-20 – instead saying he would the public finances to the black 'as early as possible in the next Parliament'.

A surplus is not expected until at least 2023. OBR forecasts said that the national debt as a proportion of national income will peak at 90.2 per cent in 2017-18.

First, the public finances should be in balance 'as early as possible' in the next parliament.

Second, debt must be falling as a percentage of GDP by the end of this parliament, and third, a new cap on welfare spending.

The Chancellor said the new fiscal rules gave him 'headroom' to bolster the economy if needed as Britain leaves the EU.